


the clearest summer could end in a downpour, could end in lightning and thunder

by completist



Series: when half of your heart will never come home (BF Angst Week 2019) [2]
Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Angst, BF Angst Week 2019, Childhood Memories, Letters, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-08
Updated: 2019-01-08
Packaged: 2019-10-06 15:25:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17347694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/completist/pseuds/completist
Summary: It was the summer of 1980, when he first met Ash in the New York Public Library.





	the clearest summer could end in a downpour, could end in lightning and thunder

**Author's Note:**

> au loosely based on/inspired by Eraserheads’ “Ang Huling El Bimbo” but without the other connotations (lol, also since we may have different interpretation of the song). Ash and Eiji are childhood friends, the rest is history from there.
> 
> Listen to the song [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lajnSJZpI34) and to the musical version i stan the most [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faj5Bo7eUXY).
> 
> title is a quote from Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz

It was the summer of 1980, when he first met Ash in the New York Public Library.

Eiji was 14 at the time, and Ash was 12. Their friendship was the easy company Eiji didn’t know he would find in a city such as New York. Ash taught him a lot during his short stay in the city, always showing up in the right moment and dragging Eiji to have a good time. He would always wear such fancy clothes but wouldn’t tell Eiji where he lives, or who his parents are. So they would just go around the city, eating ice creams, sneaking inside cinemas, pointing at some cool stuff or make up stories about the dressed mannequins in the stores. Sometimes, they would sit and watch the sun set while reading the book Ash bought with him.

It was one of the happiest summers of Eiji’s life. And Ash kept his promise of sending him letters no matter how far Japan is.

Ash’s letters was always long, like he can’t say enough, like he’s afraid he will not be able to send another letter so he would just say everything now. He would tell Eiji about his days, his boring lessons, how he understood the topic the first time it was taught, and no matter what praise he receives, it all rings hollow to him. He would tell Eiji about the sunset he watched before writing him, and closes that same letter telling him about the sun now rising.

He doesn’t know why Ash would take a whole night to write, doesn’t ask what makes Ash evade sleep at night.

Once, he told Eiji he has a brother. But it was a single sentence, a fleeting thought—like Ash didn’t realized he wrote it. Once, he told Eiji about Cape Cod, its sprawling fields, and the summers he could count in one hand spent by the river, or under the shade of a tall, old tree. Once, he told Eiji about his new teacher, and how this one understands better than anyone else. How he asked him to send the photo he had enclosed in the letter.

It was also the last letter he received from Ash, the last he had seen of him. Eiji couldn’t help but admire how beautiful and strong Ash has grown to be—the lithe lines of his body hugged by the bomber jacket he’s wearing over a white tank top. Staring at the black and white photograph, Eiji couldn’t help but imagine the bright green of his eyes, the shade of his hair, or the way the sunlight hits his face when the photo was taken.

But that was years ago, he hasn’t heard from Ash since. Eiji tried to get back to New York again, but he couldn’t, tried to excel in his sport so he can go and compete outside the country, but he couldn’t.

Ash told him in one of his letters that he admires how Eiji can fly, how he wishes to fly with Eiji as a new dawn breaks over them.

Ash told him a lot in all those letters, but Ash never once talked nor promised about going to Japan.

Now, Eiji is dragging his feet from the airport, his bag filled with all the letters and a single photograph Ash sent him for two years before they lost contact.

Now, Eiji can barely look at New York sweeping past the car window. Shorter—a friend of Ash’s, he says—drives them through the city in silence. Eiji took one look at him and decided  _ yeah, he looked like a friend of Ash’s,  _ because Shorter too, tried to talk to him in broken English before realizing Eiji could understand him well enough.

Now, as Eiji looks out at Cape Cod. He recalls the way Ash once described it, and how it doesn’t look as bright and lively as he once thought it to be.

 

 

 

Ash died on a Thursday.

He doesn’t know how it happened, doesn’t even ask. Eiji just sat there, until Shorter leaves him to it. He sat there until the sun begins to set, then he brings out all of Ash’s letter to him, all of the letters he sent to Ash that Shorter handed to him before giving him his space.

“I thought you have the right to know. He always talked about you, Eiji, kept all of your letters even if he can’t send any back to you. It’s what kept him going.”

He sat there there until the sun begins to set, then he brings out a pen and a couple of blank pages of paper and begins to write.

He writes again to Ash, like he always do. He writes about the times they were together, how he misses those times when Ash would hold him by the arm, or by his hand as they sneak around the city. He writes about how he have always wanted for Ash to visit Japan durings its spring so he can teach him this dance Eiji learnt from his first year in college, how he had wanted for Ash to go with him at the end of that summer in 1980.

He writes again to Ash, he writes and cries his eyes out as he sit beside his grave. He writes how he wished he could’ve seen Ash again, how he wished he could’ve been there for Ash, to share his burden, to share happiness with him.

He writes about the love that turned into sorrow, about time now forever lost to death. He writes about how he felt that one time Ash wrote to him about his dream—when they were dancing as dawn breaks over New York. He writes about how he felt when Ash wrote to him about that morning Eiji left—when he tried to catch a last glimpse of Eiji before their car leaves for the airport.

 

 

 

Eiji falls asleep against the tree, and wakes up to a room he easily recognized as the one Ash told him about once. He wakes up tired, his hands feeling numb, his mind chasing the wisps of a dream when he was with Ash, dancing as a new dawn breaks over them, chases a dream when Ash kisses his neck, but never got to kiss his lips and whisper his love.

**Author's Note:**

> so the song is about love lost to time and tragedy, it also has other connotations but im not going to talk about it here hahaha!
> 
> hmu on [twitter](https://twitter.com/completist_) and [tumblr](http://queen---queer.tumblr.com/)


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